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What role did the characters play in hamlet
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Hamlet - Ophelia's Identity
There are volumes of critical analyses devoted to William Shakespeare's Hamlet. As the title indicates, Hamlet is the main character of the play, but there are other characters who are also important to the plot. So much attention has been given to Hamlet's antics that characters such as Ophelia remain relatively unexamined. Ophelia is a key figure in the play, and to understand her reactions to the patriarchal society in which she lives through her relationships with the men in her life adds more depth to the play. Ophelia's character is revealed through her relationships with her father, Polonius, her brother, Laertes, and her lover, Hamlet, and their characters in turn are revealed through their relationships to her.
The first opportunity to gain insight into tOphelia's behavior comes early in the play when her brother, Laertes, advises her to steer clear of Hamlet. He tells her that even though her body is grown her mind and emotions are not yet mature. Ophelia replies, "I shall the effect of this good lesson keep, / As watchman to my heart" but she later proves that she does not intend to follow Laertes' advice because she is still willing to be with Hamlet (1.3.47-48). In fact it is Hamlet's rejection of her that keeps her from him, not Laertes' advice. She further states, "Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, / Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven, / Whilst, like a puffed and reckless libertine, / Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads / And recks not his own rede" (1.3.49-53). Ophelia means that her brother should hold himself to the same standards he imposes on her. She also equates sexual abstinence with "the steep and thorny way" and sexual participation with...
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...ed her manner of behavior. Along these same lines Hamlet has been responsible for her feelings. If he loves her, she is happy, and if he loves her not, she is not. It is through these relationships that she knows how to live, and in the absence of this knowledge and direction she commits suicide.
Works Cited
Berman, Allison. "We Only Find Ourselves." Hamlet reaction papers. Wynnewood: FCS, 2000.
Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. 1600? Ed. Sylvan Barnet. New York: Signet Classic, 1998.
Showalter, Elaine. "Representing Ophelia: Women, Madness, and the Responsibilities of Feminist Criticism." Hamlet. Ed. Susanne L. Wofford. Boston: Bedford Books of St. Martin's Press, 1994. 220-238.
Wofford, Susanne L., ed. Case Studies in Contemporary Criticism, William Shakespeare: The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. Boston: Bedford Books of St. Martin's Press, 1994.
In the playwright Hamlet by William Shakespeare, there are many characters that change throughout the play. For example, Hamlet is one of the characters who changed a lot throughout the play. Hamlet changes a lot because at first, Hamlet was depressed then became suicidal and in the end, Hamlet wanted revenge. However, Ophelia is also a character that changes throughout the play. In my opinion, I believe that Ophelia’s change throughout the play is the most important because Ophelia was obedient at first, then she became depressed and lastly, she became insane.
With her father’s word being law and with that what he says she must follow, if she refuses Polonius, she risks social exclusion and grave insult to the man who controls her future. Her real attitude is clear when she has a conversation about chastity, first with Laertes, her brother, then with Polonius, her father. After Laertes rather explicitly warns Ophelia to fear losing her virginity, she replies by telling him not to lecture her, “Whiles, a puff'd and reckless libertine, / Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads, / And recks not his own rede” (1.3.48-50). When polonius gives her the same lecture and tells her not to accept Hamlet’s propositions, she simply replies, “I shall obey, my lord”
As the play opened, Hamlet and Ophelia appeared as lovers experiencing a time of turbulence. Hamlet had just returned home from his schooling in Saxony to find that his mother had quickly remarried her dead husband's brother, and this gravely upset him. Hamlet was sincerely devoted to the idea of bloodline loyalty and sought revenge upon learning that Claudius had killed his father. Ophelia, though it seems her relationship with Hamlet is in either the developmental stage or the finalizing stage, became the prime choice as a lure for Hamlet. Laertes inadvertently opened Ophelia up to this role when he spoke with Ophelia about Hamlet before leaving for France. He allowed Polonius to find out about Hamlet's courtship of Ophelia, which led to Polonius' misguided attempts at taking care of Ophelia and obeying the king's command to find the root of Hamlet's problems. Ophelia, placed in the middle against her wishes, obeyed her father and brother's commands with little disagreement. The only time she argued was when Laertes advised her against making decisions incompatible with the expectations of Elizabethan women. Ophelia tells him, in her boldest lines of the play:
When reading the text, one can comprehend that Ophelia is caught in the middle between two opposite sides. Her family (father and brother) believe that Hamlet is a womanizer rather then the philosopher that he is. They also believe that he will use her in order to achieve his own purposes, and that he would take her precious virginity only to discard it because he would never be her husband. But, Ophelia's heart mesmerized by Hamlets cunning linguistics is set on the fact that Hamlet truly loves her or loved her, even though he swears he never did. In the eye of her father and brother, she will always be a pure, wholesome girl, an eternal virgin in a sense, (due to a parents nature to always see their offspring as a child) they want her to ascend into her stereotypical role in life as a vessel of morality whose sole purpose of existence is to be a obedient wife and a committed mother. However, to Hamlet she is simply an object used to satisfy and fulfill his sexual needs. He also seems to hold her at a distant which suggests that he may...
St. Martin's, 1994. Showalter, Elaine. A. "Representing Ophelia: Women, Madness, and the Responsibilities of Feminist Criticism." William Shakespeare: The Hamlet. Ed.
Empathy is a huge word that can be broken down into subsection. Some of which were presented to us during our week in Victoria. Combining that experience with these Unit Notes, you will find a comprehensive compellation of a break down of various empathies.
Two of Ophelia’s difficulties arise from her father and brother. They believe that Hamlet is using her to take her virginity and throw it away because Ophelia will never be his wife. Her heart believes that Hamlet loves her although he promises he never has (“Hamlet” 1). Hamlet: “Ay, truly, for the power of beauty will sooner transform honesty from what it is to a bawd than the force of honesty can translate beauty into his likeness. This was sometime a paradox, but not the time gives it proof. I did love you once.” Ophelia: “Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so.” Hamlet: “You should not have believed me, for virtue cannot so inoculate our old stock ...
“And I, of ladies most deject and wretched, that sucked the honey of his music vows, now see that noble and most sovereign reason […] out of tune and harsh (3.1.13). Ophelia is a very interesting character in the book “Hamlet” written by William Shakespeare. She displays several qualities that make her interesting. Ophelia is ordered around and never speak up for herself until she finally cracks. The evidence is when her father orders Ophelia to talk to Hamlet for the first time in weeks after he told her to stop seeing Hamlet. Ophelia is also a sweet and innocent young girl. We witness this when the narrator tells the readers she follows all her father’s request without asking any questions. This shows she is innocent for not having a reason to not trust her father. Lastly, she seems depressed in some scenes. The author shows this when the narrator mentions she was feeling pressured for sex with Hamlet. It was oblivious too much for her to handle at the time. This essay will show that Ophelia possesses the three qualities just mentioned. This essay will show how the events and examples just mentioned show Ophelia unique qualities.
From a young age, many children today are taught the value of empathy and how to be empathetic toward others. According to Oxford Dictionary, empathy is, “The ability to understand and share the feelings of another” (Empathy). Empathy is a characteristic and a developed skill. It can be used by many people of varying ages, and it is beneficial in assessing situations and determining the needs of others. Empathy is a trait that has existed in some since the beginning of the world. It has also appeared as a common theme or motif in many works of writing across many genres of literature. Empathy is a theme that is highlighted through many works of literature.
Despite Ophelia’s weak will, the male characters respond dramatically to her actions, proving that women indeed have a large impact in Hamlet. Her obedience is actually her downfall, because it allows the male characters to control and use her in their schemes. Ophelia’s betrayal ends up putting Hamlet over the edge, motivating him in his quest for revenge. Ophelia is one of the two women in the play. As the daughter of Polonius, she only speaks in the company of several men, or directly to her brother or father. Since we never see her interactions with women, she suppresses her own thoughts in order to please her superiors. Yet however weak and dependent her character is on the surface, Ophelia is a cornerstone to the play’s progression. One way that her manipulation is key to Hamlet’s plot is when Polonius orders her “in plain terms, from this time forth/ Have you so slander any moment leisure/As to give words or talk with the Lord Hamlet,” (1.3.131-133). She complies with his wishes, agreeing to return any tokens of Hamlet’s love to him, verify t...
Upon close observation, Ophelia and Laertes have an extremely close relationship, often surpassing that of a brother and sister. From early on in the story, Laertes seems deeply invested in Ophelia and Hamlet’s relationship. He advises Ophelia to “weigh what loss your honor may sustain/ If with too credent ear you list his songs, /or lose your heart, or your chaste treasure open/ to his unmastered importunity” (1.3.33-36). In fact, his entire soliloquy seems to border on sexual advice to Ophelia, which implies that Laertes has some say in the matter. Perhaps the most descriptive sexualization of Ophelia is when Gertrude describes her dead body as “mermaid-like” (4.7.201) with “her clothes spread wide” (4.7.200). Describing her clothes as “spread-wide” is especially suggestive, as to reference the act of removing clothing before sex. Ophelia can never escape the sexual comparisons made to her while she is alive; it seems as though everyone only sees her as a sexual being. This reminder that is perpetuated within a patriarchal society can lead one to insanity and despair; in contemporary times, women are sexualized from a very young age, and are reminded of this via cat-calling and through the media. In this way, the failure of many characters within a patriarchal setting to view Ophelia as a
Most of the time, we react to someone else's physiological pain automatically. For instance, when we are watching a soccer match on the TV and a player distained the knee, we suddenly react with a grimace of pain. Indeed, studies indicate that people who see or imagine others in pain tend to empathically share what others feel at both behavioural and neural levels (Lamm et al., 2011). Empathy implies that we deal with the complex processes that make possible the extraction of sensory and emotional qualities of vicarious pain and map them onto the same neural substrates engaged in the first-hand experience of the same pain. Although studies originally suggested that empathy for pain involves only the anterior cingulate cortex and the anterior insula, i.e., the two main affective nodes of the pain matrix (Singer et al, 2004), subsequent evidence demonstrated that also the regions that are part of the sensory node of the pain matrix, such as the primary somatosensory and motor cortices, play an important role in the basic form of empathy for pain called sensorimotor contagion (Avenanti et al., 2005; Avenanti, Minio Paluello et al., 2006; Lamm & Decety, 2007; Singer et al., 2006, Betti and Aglioti, 2016). Painful stimuli could induce a
Another significant female character is Ophelia, Hamlet's love. Hamlet's quest for revenge interferes with his relationship with Ophelia. There is much evidence to show that Hamlet loved her a great deal, but his pretense of madness drove her to her death. Ophelia drowned not knowing what was happening to her. This can be deduced by the fact that she flowed down the river singing and happy when in truth she was heartbroken. Ophelia was very much afraid when she saw Hamlet "with his doublet all unbraced; No hat upon his head; his stockings foul'd, Ungarter'd, and down-gyved to his ancle" (Act #. Scene #. Line #). She described him as being "loosed out of hell" (Act #. Scene #. Line #). In addition to that he scared her when he left the room with his eyes still fixed on her. She is especially hurt when Hamlet tells her that he no longer loves her and that he is opposed to marriage. He advises her to go to a nunnery and avoid marriage if she can.
In the article, “An fMRI Investigation of Empathy for ‘Social Pain’ and Subsequent Prosocial Behavior”, authors Carrie L. Mastena, Sylvia A. Morellib, Naomi I. Eisenbergerb talks about a study of how the brain reacts to empathy and how it can be used to promote prosocial behavior. It places an emphasis on the importance and often overlooked aspect neuroimaging research of empathy for social behavior and how it affects people’s social experiences. The authors themselves are the ones responsible for the research conducted.
Empathy is when I am able to feel or share feelings with another person. In order to do this, to truly do this I would have to had live through exactly they did or had some telepathic emotional connection to them. Only, our minds aren’t designed this way, we can’t truly ever feel real empathy. I can’t even begin to imagine know what it would take to really feel empathy and the emotions it would give me. Empathy doesn’t really doesn’t really exist; there is no way to actually feel what another person is going through, the closest we can come to empathy is visualizing another person’s perspective, in other words, I don’t agree with Wallace that empathy is the most important thing to learn in college, how to care is.